


Controller to Animorph

by The_Rogue_Sylph



Series: Achieve: Morph [1]
Category: Animorphs, Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Andalite Alfredo, Canon Typical Violence, FAHC Au, Honestly assume any thing fahc i write is some immortal au variant, because i have a problem okay?, more or a prequel oneshot to setup the universe and shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-26
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:14:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23219107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Rogue_Sylph/pseuds/The_Rogue_Sylph
Summary: According to the yeerks, James Ryan Haywood and Epslin 413 were dead and devoured by the creatures of the cruel and blistering arizona desert. This was only true for one of them though.
Series: Achieve: Morph [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1677331
Comments: 1
Kudos: 9





	Controller to Animorph

**Author's Note:**

> This is all because of my tumblr lol. They started sending me fahc + animorphs asks and this au was born

According to the yeerks, James Ryan Haywood and Epslin 413 were dead and devoured by the creatures of the cruel and blistering arizona desert. This was only true for one of them though.

Ryan, he had been an involuntary host, picked up from his dreadful foster home by the Sharing with the promise of free food and a safe zone. He had been too trusting of the altruistic organization, up until the point he was being escorted down into the underground bunker area and having his head forced down into that cursed murky water, a slug alien entering his ear and taking control over his actions. 

Years he had suffered in silence, fighting tooth and nail when he could. He watched as the Yeerk piloted his body around, forcing him into an arizonan college (closer to the yeerks home base) and into an IT program, minoring in theatre to keep the facade of Ryan’s love of theatre intact, despite the fact the yeerk despised it. Of course he passed with flying colors and soon found himself in an IT job. Still, eight years later Ryan still fought against the yeerk in his head. It was only by luck that Ryan would find his freedom again. 

It had been a call, of him having to hop in a car and drive a few hours away to assist a job. It had been utter luck for him that his car broke down mid way through the drive, even more so that he was on the day his yeerk needed to head into the pit to recharge. Ryan could feel himself laughing at the Yeerk’s misfortune. 24 hours and he was a free man once more. While he was excited, the Yeerk was terrified. He had no cell phone, no Yeerk communication device either. He was alone.

Eventually night fell, and so did Ryan’s body in fatigue. As the night drawled on the Fugue started to hit, racking the yeerk and host both in pain. Slowly Epslin 413 died, memories of former hosts invading Ryan’s mind and leaving themselves there. Four other hosts before Ryan. One Gedd, two Hork-Bajir, and one other human, a teen that had been an involuntary host as well, one that managed to free himself the only way he could in the cage, by death. After what felt like an eternity the Yeerk receded out of Ryan’s mind, shriveled up on the cold desert ground. For the first time in forever Ryan laughed, he was free.

It wasn’t until morning that a trucker would pull off and pick Ryan up, that was the true birth of Ryan the free man, and the final nail in James the Controller’s coffin. That was the start of his hitchhiking to Los Santos, ignoring the news of the search for James Ryan Haywood. He stayed low in the city. Always wearing something to obscure his face, no use in someone actually recognizing him, even worse if it would be a controller. 

It was no surprise he was mistaken as a hitman, with the whole paranoia and face hiding thing. It was a surprise that Ryan actually went along with it. Maybe it was the fact he had seen too many deaths in his time as a controller that he was numb to it all, maybe a lingering malicious will of the yeerk that controlled him, or, most terrifyingly, maybe he had always had the capability and willingness. But becoming a hitman was a blessing as much as it cursed him. It gave him more freedom, It made it so when he killed a high level controller the Yeerks didn’t think it was a Yeerk thing but a human thing. So he passed the years like that, picking off the controllers he could, making money off his kills. 

Then the Fake AH Crew formed. He was sent an invite, a nice little postcard in his mail from one Geoff Ramsey. At first he panicked. Then he decided if this was somehow Yeerk related it would be best to play along right? Thankfully for him it wasn’t yeerk related. It was a bonafide crew, a gang of criminals. Yet as time drawled on in the crew became more and more of a dysfunctional family. Then the day came when they all died, but at the same time they didn’t. They all came back. Some, like Gavin, were up almost instantly, but others, Ryan, took hours to repair the damage. When Ryan did come back it was full of panic and wondering if Hell was home, which of course causes Geoff to laugh. Ryan gets a welcome to Immortality speech (distantly Ryan is glad that he’s yeerk free, the things the yeerks would have done to him if they knew he was immortal). After that the crew gets closer, due to their immortal status and that the more elder ones finally having people who wouldn’t die in fifty years for the first time in centuries, if not millennia. 

Ryan went soft, he had relaxed. Most days he only lounged around the penthouse in simple face paint. It had been a mistake. A grave mistake. Geoff started going off on more and more ‘meetings’ spending little to no time in the penthouse for a month. Then one night the lads didn’t come home. There were reports of a meteor hitting Mount Chilliad (Ryan doubted it was a meteor, it was probably a bug ship that malfunctioned). Ryan just hoped the lads hadn’t gone to it, but knowing them and the fact they weren’t home made Ryan anxious. Jack tried to calm Ryan down, telling him that the lads probably were just drunk and that’s why they weren’t answering their phones.

Then they came home, looking ragged as hell, scorch marks on their clothes. They were full of anxious nerves, distrust showing in their eyes as they looked at the gents, like they were expecting them to attack. Then they asked a damning question.

“So, what do you think of the existence of Aliens?” Gavin asked, the calmest of the lads. Then again Gavin was a grifter, more than a century poured into his craft. But the reactions were imminent in the crew. Ryan froze, flashbacks to Epslin 413 and his time as a controller rearing his ugly head. Ryan wasn’t the only one to react though. Geoff had frozen as well, staring the lads down, expression unreadable.

“Why do you ask Gavin?” Jack asked, genuinely confused. Ryan glanced at Jack, of course she doesn’t know. Ryan was willing to bet Jack had never knowingly interacted with a controller before. Ryan went to drop a retort when he saw Geoff reaching for something out of the corner of his eye, his heart turned to ice as he saw what it was. A Dracon Ray. Ryan didn’t think, he just acted. He leapt for Geoff, wrestling the blaster away, dimly he was aware of the Lads yelling, but adrenaline was high in Ryan’s veins. Geoff was a controller. God knows for how long. In the end Ryan won and was holding the alien gun, pointing it at Geoff’s head, snarl on his lips. The room was silent, the lads recognizing the blaster as alien, and immediately were on edge, reaching for their own weapons.

“Yeerk Fucker.” Michael growled, eyes darting from Ryan to Geoff, trying to figure out who the Yeerk was. Ryan could feel himself shake, but stayed focused on Geoff, the one confirmed Yeerk in the room.

“Bet you can’t even work that.” The Yeerk growled out. Ryan barked out a laugh, deftly armed the blaster from years of practice ingrained in his muscle memory.

“Oh don’t I? These haven’t changed since I was a controller.” Ryan said darkly. The Yeerk inhabiting Geoff twisted his friend’s face into a sneer.

“There are no cases of Hosts getting free.”

“My enslaver was Epslin-413. I was used with the intention of working IT and working my way up in a promising company. ‘I’ had to drive through the Arizona desert from one town to the next for a job. The Yeerk was supposed to go to the Yeerk Pool in the small city after the job was done to recharge there. Fortunately for me my car broke down. No one came along that road, not till the fugue set in and Epslin 413 was long dead. I am James Ryan Haywood. I faked my death to escape you parasites, today you will get a small taste of the helplessness you put my friend in.” Ryan growled out, glancing to the Lads.

“Lockdown, three days. No one leaves or enters the penthouse.” Ryan said, voice hard. 

“Yes, yeah. Lockdown. Force the Yeerk in Geoff into a fugue. But uh. I have to get one person and we need to explain ourselves.” Gavin said, dashing to the elevator. Ryan bit his lip, wanting to go after him, but the possibility of Geoff Yeerk getting Free was too much to risk. So Ryan tied Geoff down, and Jeremy tied Jack down. Jack was confused, but was willing enough while Geoff thrashed about, causing Michael to have to hold the older gent down. 

By the time Geoff was tied down Gavin was back, with someone who looked very very similar to Trevor, if Trevor wasn’t white. The clothes he was wearing were ill fitting, obviously not his own, and he didn’t even have shoes. The new Guy was looking around before zeroing in on the thrashing controller and then looking at Ryan and the Dracon Ray.

“So that’s the former Controller! Hi I’m Alfredo, not my real name but I like that name much better than my birth name. I’m an andalite and I’m here to help!” He said, then to prove his point he started morphing, ripping and shredding the clothes on his body as he went from ethnic Trevor to alien centaur with stalk eyes. Ryan was immediately at attention, memories of Visser Three flooding his mind.

“Andalite.” Ryan said, nodding to the alien.

“Okay. Story Time on what we did last night.” Gavin said, clearing his voice.

“So last night we were fucking around on Mount Chilliad. We met Trevor up there, he was doing some space stuff. We started fucking around, planning shenanigans. Then the ship fell. We of course checked it out, thinking we could snag some cool military grade shit and then gtfo. It was an Andalite ship. Inside was Alfredo and Elfangor. Elfangor was badly wounded, he was dying. Alfredo was in much better shape. Elfangor told us about the Yeerks, gave us some psychic images of them and imprinted some data of the yeerks in our minds. Then he gave us this.” Gavin nodded to Jeremy, who produced a glowing blue box that had Yeerk Geoff’s eyes bugging out.

“The Escafil Device. Or as we’ve been calling it, the Blue Cube. He. He gave us the morphing ability and told us to take Alfredo and run. We did. Visser Three, he was arriving as we were sneaking away. We heard him kill Elfangor. We ran, once we reached our car we realized we were fucked. Couldn’t take them down. And we couldn’t walk about with a blue horse thing. Alfredo, he did some fancy shenanigans and acquired us all and made his own human morph. So began our two hour at a time trek back home after putting Alfredo in a spare set of Michael’s work out clothes. We eventually got home, told Alfredo to wait in the garage, and well you know the rest.” Gavin said. 

“Where’s Trevor then?” Jack asked, frown on her face.

< Glad you asked that oh friend of mine.> A voice buzzed in their heads, sounding like Trevor. In a few seconds a fly began enlarging and becoming more and more human like, grotesquely morphing into one Trevor Collins. 

“Put your clothes on.” Michael huffed, tossing some clothes to the stark naked man.

“We’ll have to figure out clothes that go with our morphs.” Gavin muttered as Trevor pulled on his clothes. 

< Later. Right now is making sure your gent friends are free of any and all Yeerk infestations.> The andalite Thought spoke. 

“Are we tying up Ryan too or?” Jeremy trailed off, not looking like he particularly wanted to. Probably didn't help that he was still holding the blaster. Ryan disarmed it and gently set it far away from Geoff.

“If you want, it’s fine. I understand.” Being a previous host he really could understand. 

< I think he’ll be fine. Besides what are the odds he overpowers all five of us?> Alfredo responded, causing Jeremy to snort.

“Pretty damn high. Ryan’s our resident murder hobo.” Jeremy said, causing Ryan to huff and mutter am not.

< What’s a Murder Hobo?>

The three days followed a semi strict schedule, Alfredo took the night shift guard with Ryan. Then Michael or Jeremy would relieve them when the sun rose and tell them to sleep. They wouldn't and would linger about till Gavin and Trevor took over at noon as well as feeding. Jack was always cooperative while Yeerk Geoff was as much of a bastard as possible. Then six hours would go by and whichever of Gavin or Jeremy didn’t take morning took night till twelve am in which another feeding would happen with difficulty. Then at Midnight Alfredo and Ryan took over. Over and Over again. 

Till the fugue started for Yeerk Geoff. Then it was all hands on deck. While Alfredo hung back, the crew was there to help Geoff through it. Ryan repeatedly apologising to Geoff. He knew what it was like to go through the fugue, the hell of pain that came with it. Not once did Ryan leave Geoff’s side. When Geoff went limp and the Yeerk slug slid out of Geoff’s ear and shrivelled up, only then did Ryan let himself relax. 

“You made it Geoff.” He said gently.

“Just barely. God, you went through that too?” Geoff asked, voice hoarse after the Yeerk used it to yell and rage for so long before giving up.

“Yeah. Fun times.” Ryan huffed out, causing Geoff to bark out a laugh as Gavin undid his bindings. 

“Super fun.” He drawled out.

“So what next?” He asked

“We wait one more day for Jack, sorry Jack. And as long as she’s clear, we pass off the ability to morph to you three and we start planning a guerilla war?” Jeremy said, the last part coming out more as a question than statement. Ryan nodded at that. Made sense to do it all at once, and to make sure Jack wasn’t harboring a well fed Yeerk.

“Immortality and shapeshifting? We’re going to be set for eternity boys. Good thing Thelon 1111 was a greedy bitch and didn’t want to give up an immortal hist to a sub visser or visser.” Geoff said, causing Trevor to gasp and Alfredo to be taken aback.

< Immortals, that is impossible> “What, y'all are immortal too?” Alfredo’s denial and Trevor’s excitement overlapped as they were both said at the same time.

“Respawn of Six minutes.” Gavin said proudly. 

“Damn son. I only have a respawn of two hours.” Trevor huffed out. Ryan stayed back as the others began arguing with Alfredo over this, the andalite refusing to believe such a thing. Until Gavin shrugged and shot Michael in the head. Thankfully Michael was a fast healer and the wound was already stitching itself up, shocking Alfredo to silence as Geoff ranted about killing in the house. This was his home, his family. For the first time since he regained his Freedom Ryan felt strong, felt powerful, like he was more than just a pawn in some galactic game of chess. He would be able to fight these bastards once and for all. The Yeerks thought James Ryan Haywod was dead. They were dead wrong.

**Author's Note:**

> I’m debating on whether or not to do classic animorphs first person style or not for the actual stories of this au


End file.
